


Close Encounters of the Third Timeline

by DarthPeezy



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997), Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Cloud is a chaos agent, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Final Fantasy VII Remake Spoilers, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Reincarnation, SOLDIER Cloud Strife, That's not how materia work, Time Travel, Timeline Shenanigans, mentor genesis, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:53:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26222176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarthPeezy/pseuds/DarthPeezy
Summary: Cloud Strife is born with the memories of two dead worlds. Armed with the knowledge of mistakes made, he sets out to change everything. And winds up a cosmic plaything.In which, Cloud gets a third chance to fix all his past mistakes and in the process makes a whole host of new mistakes.
Relationships: Angeal Hewley & Genesis Rhapsodos & Sephiroth, Cloud Strife & Cloud Strife's Mother, Cloud Strife & Vincent Valentine, Red XIII | Nanaki & Cloud Strife, Zack Fair & Cloud Strife
Comments: 30
Kudos: 288





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is both Compilation and Remake Part 1 compliant.  
> This is crack taken seriously more than it is pure crack. Horrible things happen just as much as ridiculous things. Maybe even more.  
> Do not expect an update schedule.

The end of the world heralds Claudia Strife’s son into life.

At least, it feels that way.

Lightning streaks across the sky so bright that it leaves her blind, thunderclaps that leaves her bones shaking. Rain and hail pelt her home so hard she’s certain there will be broken windows and pockmarks through the door. Despite the darkness, the distant horizon is strange. Draped red as if the door to the realm of demons has been opened and yet flooded by bright green streaks in dazzling fractal patterns.

Claudia Strife is a practical woman. She doesn’t believe in the stories her mother told her of their home on the far side of the world, stories of gods and demons and an endless war the likes of which will touch every corner of the world, a war that will see brothers fight brothers and friendships destroyed. She listened to her mother name the gods and the ways in which they will perish when the twilight of their reign comes. She memorised the names of the great guardians that would plague mankind, gargantuan weapons borne of the world’s lifeblood and hate.

And whilst she never believed her mother, she did love the story of the saviour born twice. When the world nears its end, when the Parting of Ways was at its height, when godsblood has been spilt and demons slaughter mankind, he would appear. With his great axe, he would split demons in half. With his great spells, he would bind the guardians to eternal slumber. With his golden eyes, he would outmanoeuvre the fate of the world, the fate of mankind. And if there is no hope in sight, if the only future is to be ash and fire, he would swing his hammer and destroy everything that was, is, or could be. His blow would break open time itself and rewrite the story. Once more, born again, the saviour would battle.

They were fun stories as a kid. Certainly, there were bloodier and cooler than the stories Nibelheim’s village elder would tell of the summons, stories of the great Shiva saving the world from Ifrit’s fire from what Claudia gathers infers to have been the very first divorce in history. Or how Ramuh somehow fathered the lightning horse Ixion and the grand thunderer Raiden, and when they fell from grace in the battle against Bahamut, from their corpses the god Odin was birthed.

Today, it genuinely feels like there might have been some truth to those stories. As thunder deafens her and lightning blinds her, Claudia curses every god she knows and blames them for the piece of shit who refuses to come out. Her son—and it can only be a boy because only someone with a dick could be this inconsiderate—has taken over a day and he’s still not here. The storm has also raged for a day.

Her midwife mumbles prayers with each flash of lightning. It got truly tiring after the third hour. When Claudia curses, the midwife begs the gods for forgiveness. Begs them for mercy. Begs them for anything really. It changes every few hours.

“Help me get him out and I swear the storm will end,” she hisses and prays that her son lives an interesting life, prays that he experiences even a tenth of the difficulty she’s going through right now.

In the end, the storm does stop when her son is born. Claudia doesn’t notice. She’s exhausted and worn down. Not in a state to notice the midwife glance between the sky and her son in horror. She does, however, notice when the midwife curses.

“Gods be good.”

Claudia frowns and rises from her stupor. “Give him here.”

The midwife walks over slowly and places the bundled child in her arms. And then Claudia sees her son in all his glory. Wisps of blonde hair just like hers, thankfully not the pale almost silvery blonde of the father. Most of all, she sees his eyes. Gold.

Bright, vibrant gold. Eyes like fields of wheat or burnished copper. Eyes like the sun at the height of summer.

Claudia knows for a fact that children are born with dark eyes. Whether that’s black or slate grey or navy doesn’t matter because that’s what humans do.

And then she realises her child is silent. He’s staring back at her, but he doesn’t scream or cry or anything so mundane. No, her son watches her with intelligence unfathomable on a child.

“Well shit.”

* * *

Cloud Strife learns from a young age that he’s different from other children. He learns it in phases over his childhood.

By the time most children are learning words, Cloud could already form sentences. He may not have been able to pronounce the words, but he knew them. His memory of those first helpless years is clear as crystal. His first awkward and tottering steps that left him frustrated because he knew what to do but his body refused to obey him. Being unable to perform the most basic tasks had been almost as traumatic as the occasional flashes of violence being done to him and those he loved like Tifa—who he knew about before meeting—or his mother who patiently changed his nappy every time Cloud had to shit and piss himself. That had stopped the moment he could walk straight to the toilet.

At the age of four, he learns that children shouldn’t be anywhere near as agile or graceful as he is. The other children, even the older ones, bump into things regularly. They aren’t aware of their bodies, of the space they occupy. Cloud is like a ghost in comparison. His steps are careful and deliberate, silent as well, and he drifts through Nibelheim quietly. He startles most people at least a few times before they slowly learn to ignore his sudden appearances. The villagers come to expect him standing in their blind spots and stop being surprised when he hands over tools without prompting or neatly organises bundles of goods and materials. He’s a ghost of a child, silent, but helpful.

His mother always finds him even when he tries his damndest to sneak up on her. He quiets his breathing and hides his presence, drawing in the near-invisible living energy that all humans and animals emit. That’s another thing he doesn’t realise is strange. No one else can see the things he can. They can’t see the lifestreams intersecting with everything. They don’t see the black dust that surrounds them on occasion.

“There’s nothing there,” he’s told on more than one occasion.

“Fucking weirdo,” another kid will say when Cloud walks oddly through the village, dodging waves of sand that only he sees.

As he sneaks through their home, he doesn’t realise how strange it is for a child to know how to hide. Nor does he question how he knows things before being taught. His mother’s tales are interesting but he knows the ending before she gets to it.

He’s in the kitchen in the dead of night. No one should be awake at this ungodly aware. Cloud certainly shouldn’t, but he knows his mom hid a stash of cookies somewhere and he wants them. All of them. Right now.

He hops onto a counter and clambers up to the topmost shelf. There, just beyond reach is a cookie jar. Cloud grins. Tonight will be a good night.

“Go back to bed!”

Cloud startles and falls off the counter. He tries twisting and landing correctly but misses and lands on his ass. Cloud winces, pain flaring, and refuses to cry. Instead, he glares petulantly up and to the right where his mother’s room is.

“I’m not doing anything,” he hollers back.

“You’re awake past curfew. Go back to bed or save me the trouble and go pick out a stick.”

Cloud grimaces. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time he’d been beaten for being naughty. For all that he loves his mother, there are lines he shouldn’t cross. Cloud can’t help but try anyway. Just as the village elders can attest to, Cloud has absolutely no regard to the rules. He’s been dragged back to the village kicking and screaming by Shinra soldiers more than once. It’s not his fault he wants to know why there’s a giant mass of something evil calling out to him.

“Fine. Can I play outside tomorrow?”

“After you do your chores and homework.”

He trudges back to bed. The ceiling is a boring enough sight for a few hours. He tries avoiding sleep because his dreams are plagued with blood and battles and demons. The nightmares sometimes wake Ma up, and that’s not fair to her. He’d rather sleep late and have the nightmares right around the time she’d usually be up anyway.

Ma wakes him up around seven, letting him sleep in a bit. There’s concern on her features. Probably, Cloud was thrashing in his sleep.

Breakfast is a hearty meal of oat porridge with just a smidge of honey. He smiles at her. Honey isn’t exactly cheap and the Strife’s aren’t exactly swimming in cash. Or even dipping a pinkie in the cash pool. All the things he’d taken for granted growing up had all been hard-won by his mother’s efforts and carefully maintaining his father’s pension.

Cloud never asks about his father. He’s never seen grief and rage mix so well until he asked about Dad one day.

“You’ve got me, silly,” she said calmly as though Cloud hadn’t just hit her emotional weakness entirely on accident. “That’s all you need.”

After that, he’d completely dropped the subject of his Dad. Maybe he worked for Shinra. Maybe for one of the few companies still functioning outside their grip. Whatever he did, the pension cheques came in consistently every quarter. He’d made do with the knowledge he would never know anything about his father.

As he grows older, wanting to know his father becomes less important. The flashes of confusing thoughts and memories slowly become distinct. It’s even weirder then realising that he’s Cloud Strife, but he’s not the only Cloud Strife. He’s not the first guy who learnt how to win or the second guy who kept on losing despite being stronger than ever. One thing they both have in common is the lack of a father in the fragmented memories of childhood.

But, his Ma is here with him and that’s more than enough. Sometimes, he spends days choked by the grief of the other two Clouds after seeing her smile or make a joke or cook their favourite meal. During those times, he’s even more of a ghost than usual, shutting down emotionally and trying to find refuge in his loneliness. Those times make him even stranger in the eyes of the village, but some are kind enough to give him random chores to do to occupy himself until he separates the other Clouds from who he is in the here and now.

For all that those two became powerful legends, Cloud wants nothing more than to be the exact opposite. He wants a boring, peaceful life. Because if he, of all people, can achieve that then maybe the Planet will be just fine.

Because of those memories, he doesn’t complain about chores. Getting water from the well is boring and tedious. The buckets are almost as large as him which makes them awkward to carry even if they aren’t particularly heavy. The only person who bats an eye at a kid carrying a bucket heavier than him is the guy from out of town staying in the inn. From what Cloud’s heard, the stranger is from one of the towns in the forest come to request something of the Mayor, Mister Lockhart.

In his spare time, he spends his day planting bushes and plants and trees at the base of Nibel mountain and around the village. It isn’t the craziest thing anyone’s ever done and soon enough, he finds other people tending to the plants. It’s a weird mishmash of plants that would probably make an ecologist have a heart attack but Cloud had to spend two rebirths to gain even the tiniest green thumb. That ecologist can go choke on his plants. And if the Planet had an issue with it then maybe it should stop encouraging people to give him seeds and saplings as a gift.

When the first flowers bloom two Springs later, he’s not the only person satisfied. A part of him is worried about the rapid growth of the plants. They’d gone from barren to a teeming village of flowers and tall trees in all of two years.

“Demon,” he hears Mister Lockhart whisper one day.

Cloud rolls his eyes. A real demon wouldn’t be planting flowers to deal with the negative effects of a mako reactor before they could get far worse.

It also really helps that he has a copious amount of golden magic to burn and infusing it into the plants is a great way to spend it. The plants themselves are soothing. He feels the lifestream flow pleasantly, almost joyfully. Maybe he’ll never hear the Planet speak to him, but whatever was done to make him left him attuned enough to feel these simple moments of joy.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which, Cloud fights a dragon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Non-descriptive beating of a child.

Childhood is still a mystery to Cloud. He’s got decades worth of fighting experience slumbering deep in the back of his mind but his childhood is mostly gone. The people he once was don’t even remember his mother’s name—and hadn’t that just been a surprise when he saw the name on her pension cheque—let alone the layout of Nibelheim. They’d seen the fake village Shinra had made and never once come back.

So, he doesn’t have experiences to help him navigate childhood. He gets the sense that his previous incarnations were sullen and angry children. Poor and without a father, he’d been an easy target for the entire village to hate. Except, this time, he’s a very, very strange child. Golden eyes aren’t normal and he’s heard people whispering when he isn’t looking. His sneaking habits have only strengthened the rumours that he’s not entirely natural. And his intelligence borne of two lifetimes have made him an even odder sight.

Fortunately, he’s old enough to be comfortable with silence and enjoy his time alone. He also knows how to repair a whole bunch of equipment from years spent listening to Cid. People quickly learn to put up with your strangeness when you’re useful. Who cares if the golden-eyed kid rarely talks if he can repair a fridge or a motor or what have you? And since he never asks for anything, the nicer adults start feeling guilty and leave him cookies. Or honey bread. Or sugar plums in Missus Lockhart’s case. 

Except for Tifa’s dead who somehow became Mayor of Nibelheim just before Cloud was born.

That man gives the impression that he would have drowned Cloud at birth if not for the ongoing row he and Ma have going on. It might have something to do with him calling Cloud ‘demon spawn’ more than once or shorting the Strife family on their share of the reactor income for whatever inane reason he has.

Which is why Cloud totally isn’t surprised that he’s barred from ever going to the Mayor’s home when Tifa’s mother falls ill.

“He cursed her, I tell you,” Mister Lockhart will say when he thinks neither Strife is nearby. Nearby for Cloud is pretty damned far away. The perks of enhanced senses.

The village healers think an elixir will help heal her except those are exorbitantly expensive even for the Lockhart wealth. The ingredients are rare and the manufacturing techniques haven’t yet been refined for them to be ubiquitous. Even then, price doesn’t mean anything if you can’t get any.

“I’m climbing the mountain,” he says to Tifa early in the morning. “I’ll get the stuff to make a remedy.”

They’re not friends exactly, and Cloud isn’t the most popular kid around. But she does pity him to some extent after the embarrassment with Master Zangan.

“You can’t even throw a punch,” she retorts.

Cloud flushes. It’s not his fault that punches are weird and awkward and make no sense. Put a stick in his hand and he’s way stronger than all the other kids. Like every other kid in the village, he had tried to impress the Master Zangan. His agility and coordination borne from whatever the Planet did to him let Cloud complete the obstacle course and every fitness test in record time. By the end, Master Zangan had looked at Cloud as if all his hopes and dreams were reborn.

Then Cloud tried to throw a punch.

Somehow, he’d stumbled on flat ground, completely missed the target with his fist and slammed into it with his nose. Then Cloud fell on his ass. Cloud remembers watching Master Zangan’s hopes and dreams crumble in that one moment. More than that, he still has nightmares of Zangan’s only word:

_ “Pathetic. _ ”

Cloud shivers at that memory but shakes his head. Tifa had taken pity on him after that embarrassing display and they’d become friends of a sort. She’d even taught him how to kick properly. Punches, though, are still beyond him.

“That’s why I’m bringing this.” 

He takes out his secret weapon from his pack.

Tifa’s eyes widen. “Are you insane?”

“Cautious.”

Nibel Mountain isn’t something a child should be climbing. That doesn’t stop most Nibel kids from trying it at least once. Usually, it ends with a few bruises and a respectful fear of the dangerous ecosystem. Everyone talks about the wolves because those are common enough on the plains and of course the dragons as the apex predator on the peak. But in between, there’s a whole horde of monsters and even regular animals enhanced by being near such a mako rich area.

There’s a reason the horse business in Nibel does so well. Want a horse to get you from one side of the country and fight off monsters as well? Then the Nibel plains have you covered.

An aggressive ram nearly drives Cloud off the mountain. Cloud ducks and weaves from it. He only gets away because a Zuu decides to make quick work of the ram. He doesn’t throw up seeing the ram shredded in an instant, but it is a close thing.

After that, he does his best to hide his presence and stalks his way up the mountain. The main paths are teeming with monsters so Cloud decides to scale vertical cliff faces instead. The strength the Planet granted him is disproportionate to his size. Carrying weight heavier than him is easy, so climbing a mountain isn’t too bad even with his pack weighing down on him.

The damage from the Mako reactor on the ecosystem isn’t complete just yet. The mountain isn’t yet the utterly barren wasteland of his memories. There’s still tough bushes and hardy plants, a few trees here and there on the upper level.

When he looks back, however, he can see the flowers and bushes he planted growing up the mountain. Maybe one day, Mount Nibel will be returned to its former glory. He’s got a suspicion that Mako extraction, whilst terrible, could probably reach equilibrium if enough natural life is kept around. Because really, how did the Ancients make mako crystal superstructures and somehow crystallise their experiences into materia?

The mako spring’s trees are dying, their branches withered and worn. Cloud runs his hand along their flaky bark feeling a surge of grief. This close to the reactor, he can feel how choked the lifestream is. The planet isn’t crying out like Barrett would think. Here, it’s dying with hardly a whimper.

Maybe Cloud can fix that just a bit. Where his fingers touch, gold sparks appear. Bits and pieces of his magic, of his soul given power, are returned to the planet. He touches each tree lovingly, patiently. It isn’t something Cloud Strife would do but it is something Aerith would do, and Cloud will always love Aerith and all she loves.

He kneels near the mako spring. Only one medicinal herb grows. It is small and tiny, almost shrivelled. It is the last one growing here and the only herb in the world that will make an elixir. Bright red petals and blue leaves that almost glow in the darkness.

Cloud digs it out at the root. Every portion of the plant is needed. The leaves. The stem. The roots. Nothing can remain. He places it in a hard case within his pouch. From that same case, he removes a few metal jars and fills them with liquid mako.

Within another case are a bunch of saplings and cuttings from other plants around the village. It takes him a long hour to plant them all as each needs an infusion of magic. Maybe this won’t work being so close to the reactor. But this spring had survived a decade into the future. If anything can survive, then it will be here.

When he’s done, he shoulders his pack and heads out the cave system. The crisp Nibel air greets him.

So do the gleaming scales of a fucking Nibel dragon, reflecting the bright light of noon. Cloud stares at it. It stares back with acidic yellow eyes and an aura of indifferent malice.

“I hate my life.”

The dragon raises its wing to reveal a smaller Nibel dragon, a much paler shade of green than its mother. He tenses as the mother dragon leaps back, flapping its wings. It settles around a rock spire and puts its head on its paws, closing its eyes.

Cloud gets the message. Somehow, he’s become training material. The mother wouldn’t bother him if he gets past the baby.

Being the reasonable mountain kid he is, Cloud always has a hunting knife on hand. He throws the knife. It’s a short distraction at best, but for a younger dragon whose scales haven’t hardened, it turns its head aside, almost afraid. It gives Cloud enough time to remove the heaviest item in his pack.

Cloud whips out his mother’s 12-gauge shotgun.

“You’re not the only one with firepower.” Obligatory cool one-line said, Cloud primes the weapon.

Then he pulls the trigger.

** Blam. **

The crack is so loud it leaves everything ringing, the recoil sharp enough the even braced, Cloud can already feel hug bruise blooming.

The baby dragon is bleeding mildly from a few wounds. Even young, a shotgun isn’t much of a danger to it unless you get up close and shoot it in the mouth which Cloud isn’t stupid enough to do. Its mother is watching and will probably eat Cloud for lunch if he tries that.

He pumps the shotgun, the shell ejecting and a new one sliding home. And then he fires again.

The baby screeches, flapping its wings and trying to put distance between them. Cloud dashes forward and closes the distance.

Cloud slides down beneath the dragon, firing the shotgun again. He misses his mark of the torso and winds up hitting it in the ass.

The dragon’s indignant roar is loud and rattles Cloud’s bones. His instincts scream and he knows he probably should have run.

A wave of fire has Cloud yelping and dashing aside, ass probably on fire. He rolls to extinguish the flames, reloading the gun in the process. He stops on his stomach and twists around to face the baby dragon thundering towards him.

Cloud waits until the last possible second before leaping towards the dragon. It stares at him in astonishment, slowing down in the process. Cloud fires again, hitting it in the snout.

And then he’s running because Mama dragon doesn’t sound happy with him. Cloud jumps off the craggy cliff, hoping against hope that he’s got his directions correct.

The old rickety bridge comes into view. Cloud smiles, then he remembers he’s falling a few dozen feet with a loaded shotgun. Frantically, he pulls the safety lever moments before hitting the bridge with a sharp snap.

Things go dark for a long time. It is only after the fact that he recognises he has blacked out from the pain. Everything hurts when he regains consciousness. His whole body is one giant blob of pain. He groans and decides to stay in place for a few more minutes until he’s healed enough to move.

A few minutes winds up being a few more hours. By then, his cuts have stopped bleed and some of his bones are in the correct place. There may have been a bit of crying. Well, a lot of crying, but that’s not important. No one will ever find out about that. Especially not Tifa. She’d never stop teasing him for crying like a little baby.

It’s getting dark when Cloud finally works up the energy to make the arduous trip home. Each step sends a flair of pain shooting up his left leg. Probably something fractured. His collarbone is just one big mess and he doesn’t even want to experiment with moving his right arm.

And that’s how Cloud returns to Nibelheim with his ponytail singed and his eyebrows gone. He has some burns and probably a bit of internal bleeding. He’s also covered in deep scratches, a motley collection of bruises and generally looks like he lost a fight to a dragon.

He trudges through the clinic’s front door. It’s empty enough that he only draws a few startled stares from the occupants. The villager inside stares at Cloud in complete horror. Well, Cloud probably does look as bad as he feels. Cloud rolls his eyes because apparently, no one has ever seen an injury. It’s not like he just got sliced to shreds by a Sephiroth clone and shot in the back by said clone’s sibling. This is nothing compared to that.  _ I’m even walking on my own two feet. _

“Here.” He drops the vial of natural mako and the pouch of healing herbs onto a desk. “For the Lockharts.”

That startles the doctor into action. He isn’t really a doctor so much as a city nurse who retired here and studied more. To his surprise, the doctor ignores the bag and rushes to Cloud.

“What the heck happened to you?” the Doctor asks, opening Cloud’s good eye more and shining a light.

“A Nibel dragon decided I’d make good target practice for her kid.”

He winces as the doctor pokes and prods, cataloguing Cloud’s injuries. Probably. That or the doctor just wants to see Cloud squirm in pain.

“You’re lucky you’re alive. Stay.”

The doctor heads to his office and returns a few moments later with a materia in hand. A second after, the cool warmth of a healing spell settles over him. It isn’t a Cure but rather a Regen. A curious choice.

“I’ll have to set things right,” the doctor explains. “A Cure right now would probably cripple you.”

That’s a rather reasonable explanation. In his past lives, Soldier augments dealt with all that nonsense. And when potions, Curagas, or elixirs didn’t work, there was always the good old Phoenix Down. Two lifetimes later and Cloud is still pissed off that Masamune can inflict wounds even a Summon who can entirely ignore the idea of death can’t heal.

“Thanks.”

“Now, why were you fighting a Nibel dragon?”

Cloud would answer, he really would. However, his life expectancy drops very suddenly.

“Cloud Pertinax Otho Strife!”

He glances over his shoulder and sees his mother in the middle of the town square, hands on her hips and a furious expression. Her scream was loud enough to draw the attention of the whole village. Or maybe the spectacle of Cloud Strife Doing Something Crazy Again had drawn their attention. Either way, his Ma looks ready to finish what the dragon started.

Cloud does the only reasonable thing an eight-year-old can.

He runs.

There aren’t a lot of good places to run given that there’s a whole lot wrong with his body. So, instead of running horizontally, he runs vertically.

“Cloud Gordian Macrimus Strife, get down from the water tower right now!”

“Why, so you can finish what the dragon started?”

“Yes.” She says it so bluntly that his jaw drops. “I’m going to cane you one way or another. You get to choose how long it goes on for.”

“Oh, that kid’s fucked,” a bystander mutters but Cloud picks it up.

“Those aren’t even my real names,” Cloud calls back.

“Yeah, well I’m angry and your names will be as long as I want them to be. Now get down from there.”

“I’d rather deal with the dragon.”

“Are you calling me a cold, unfeeling reptile?”

He knows he shouldn’t. He really, really shouldn’t. Every instinct he has is telling him not to. He’s also eight, scared and upset.

“You heard me the first time.”

“Yeah, imma beat that kid for Missus Strife after she’s done.”

He finds himself lifted by the collar. Looking over his shoulder, he catches Zangan’s sharp features. Then the bastard jumps and they’re in front of his mother.

“You traitor.”

Ma grabs Cloud by the ear and twists it so hard he kinda wants to be fighting the baby dragon again. She drags him home, completely ignoring the doctor, the townspeople, or Cloud’s pleas. He also isn’t surprised when she leaves him in the kitchen and grabs her cooking spoon.

“It was just a baby dragon.”

Whack. 

“You’re a baby,” she snaps.

Whack.

“I’m eight.”

Whack.

“Exactly.”

Whack.

“I’m sorry!

Whack.

“You better be.” Whack. “Honestly, calling your mother a cold reptile.”

“You’re proving my point.”

Whack.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which, Cloud learns that good intentions can't fix everything.

Once Ma’s gotten the angry parent out of her, she goes straight to a concerned parent. Within the hour, Cloud’s clean, checked over by the village doctor again—who didn’t even have the slightest bit of sympathy over his Ma beating him because no one causes more problems than Cloud—and covered in bandages that were soaked in potions before being dried. He’s dubious of how effective they actually are, but he won’t complain if it means Ma’s done hitting him for the day.

There’s a rather short list of things he’s allowed to do during his recovery period. Most of them amount to staying in bed for the next few months given how bad his injuries.

“You didn’t have to hit that hard,” Cloud whines beneath his thick blankets, shivering despite the warmth of the room. His ass is the only part of him that’s warm.

She scoffs. “Please, you walk off a broken arm in a few days. You were just whining.”

“I have six broken bones, internal bleeding, bruised organs, and more fractures than I can count.”

“I taught you to count so I know you’re lying.” Still, she runs her fingers through his hair gently. “You’ve always been just fine. Even if you are trying to send me to an early grave.”

“I said I’m sorry.”

“I know you are but it was still stupid. Now get some rest.”

Sleep comes easily. Whatever pain medicine the doctor gave him—a dose Ma tripled because she knows exactly how well his body burns through medication—contributes to that. Within minutes, Cloud is fast asleep.

He vaguely recalls waking up at some point to take a piss with Ma’s help, but he can’t be sure if that’s a dream or not when he next wakes up. It’s getting dark and the room is chilly from the open windows. He frowns. That was closed when he fell asleep. The setting sun is filtered by the pot of plants on his windowsill, a massive bush of creeping vines and red flowers that is getting a bit too big for its pot. He’ll have to replant it the next few weeks or so with the rate it’s growing.

“You awake?” Ma calls from downstairs. Somehow, she always knows when he’s awake.

“Yeah,” he hollers back, chest hurting from the effort.

Ma doesn’t come up immediately. He can hear her fiddling with the fridge and some cutlery. Then the sharp whine of the electric stove. Theirs is one of the earlier models, ancient by all standards, and something’s wrong with one of the coils. Even Cloud’s best efforts hadn’t been enough to fix it. A replacement will cost more money than they have available.

He dozes lightly, soothed by Ma’s singing. She isn’t a good singer objectively, but that doesn’t matter. As far as Cloud’s concerned, she’s the best-damned singer there ever was. Footsteps wake him up and soon he sees her entering his room, a bowl of dinner in her hand. It smells nice and makes Cloud’s stomach rumble like a beat-up motor.

“The midwife was terrified of you,” Ma says softly over dinner.

Cloud refuses to let her spoon-feeds him. He’s bedridden, not completely helpless. Besides, he can feel things setting themselves to rights with his enhanced healing.

“I know you call me a menace but I couldn’t have been that bad?”

“The storm was bad enough. Felt like the end times were here. Felt like the Parting of Ways came early. And then you came out with those gold eyes.”

Cloud misses his blue eyes. Those were normal and safe. Even after the experimentation, they marked him as a SOLDIER. Gold just makes him weird. And he’s pretty sure they don’t match well with his pale complexion.

“I thought you liked them?”

“I do because they’re yours. I just also wished you were more normal.”

“Ouch.” He says it lightly but the child in him is hurt.

“I wish you were boring and normal because then I wouldn’t have to worry so much. But you’re you, Cloud. Amazing and wonderful and usually a little shit, but you’re my Cloud.”

“Why that name? Why Cloud?”

“My mother’s name was Claudius. Then came me, Claudia.”

“What went wrong with my name?”

“You were a nightmare to get out of me so I was too tired to write your name properly. And that’s why you’re Cloud instead of Claud.”

“That’s not even a real name.”

She rolls her eyes. “It is where we’re from. My Ma ran off and wound up in Nibelheim. Said she got tired of all the tribal fighting.”

“What kind of backwater has tribal fighting?”

“The kind where the closest translation to your name is Strife. Where’d you think all the stories I told you came from? Certainly, ain’t here with all them sanitised stories about the Summons.” She shakes her head. “If you’d been born there, there are even odds they would have strangled you at birth or worshipped you as a god,” Ma says. “Their Saviour had gold eyes. Their saviour lived twice and came back to save them.”

“What do you think?”

“I think they’d have realised you’re a little menace and run for the hills.”

That startles a laugh out of him. That laugh soon turns into a cough. Ma takes his bowl away before he spills it as he hacks his lungs out. It doesn’t stop for a good few minutes, and by the end, his chest feels like someone took a few razors to his lungs and decided to make a post-modernist art piece. Thankfully, the coughs are dry and without blood. That would have been annoying because then they’d have to call the doctor again and get things sorted out and Cloud never wants to be that inconvenient to other people.

“I’m fine.” He forces a smile. “Just give me two days and I’ll be running around the village causing all sorts of trouble.”

“I’m supposed to be reassuring you, not the other way round.”

“Well, I’m awesome.”

“No, you’re a nightmare and everyone in the village knows it.”

“They feed me.”

“In the hopes you’ll get a food coma and stop being difficult for a few hours.”

The days pass quietly as Cloud heals. Three days later and he can comfortably walk around the house. In a week, Ma is fine with him leaving the house. It had taken cajoling, needling, a check-up from the doctor—who nearly had a heart attack at seeing Cloud walking easily—and a bout of acrobatics before she relented.

He makes his triumphant return to the village on the eighth day. Except, the village is quiet. The usual hustle and bustle are gone. The few adults he sees look away from him immediately. Cloud goes through is morning chores with sinking dread until he finds another kid his age.

He learns from that kid that the elixir didn’t work and Missus Lockhart died in her sleep.

“Huh,” is all he says.

Then he forces a smile and keeps going about his day. That’s just life, right? People die and there’s nothing at all that you can do to change that no matter how hard you try. Destiny comes all the same and some people are just destined to die. Doesn’t matter that you killed fate and made it your bitch because a bitch can be vindictive and bite back.

He doesn’t say anything to anyone and he certainly isn’t glaring at everyone he sees. He also certainly doesn’t kick a tree down in his anger or fracture a bone or two in the process. Nope, he’s perfectly fine and well adjusted. So, could everyone stop giving him pitying looks. He’s still got a Ma.

* * *

Cloud hasn’t seen a single hair of Tifa since he heard the news. The grief hit her hard if his memories are accurate. Missus Lockhart was a kind woman and always made time for everyone. She loved Nibelheim and Nibelheim loved her back.

The entire village attends the funeral. Life and death affect a tiny village far more acutely than a big city. Cloud saw people die in the slums and only a few had cared or even noticed. But, with Missus Lockhart, they get visitors from the towns and villages in the valley and forest and even a few further away.

The sky is clear and the air cold. A good day to live. A good day to be buried as well. The funeral takes hours, condolences being given out and stories of Missus Lockhart being told. He wonders how selfish he was to never really remember her despite all the stories Tifa would tell him in two different lifetimes. It is nothing short of cruelty.

Admittedly, Mister Lockhart didn’t have to be a complete asshole about keeping the Strifes as far away from proceedings as possible. He hadn’t actually said or done anything outside of one sharp glare in the morning towards Cloud, but everyone got the message, and no one wants to poke and prod at a grieving widower. 

Ma doesn’t argue with him for once. She only holds Cloud’s hand the entire time. And when the funeral is done, they go home.

She meets his eyes and pulls him close. Cloud refuses to cry. He shakes, but he doesn’t cry.

“People die, baby boy. That’s just life.” 

“It’s not fair.”

“I know. But it is what it is. We get one chance and no other.”

He smiles bitterly. “What if we got more than once? What if we make the same mistakes despite that?”

“Then you try again. That’s all we can ever do. Try and be better. If you make one thing better, then isn’t that enough?” In her warm eyes, he sees that she knows despite never having said a thing. She knows the truth, knows that he’s lived before, and loves him all the same despite his failings.

“I should have saved her,” he sobs, letting his tears run freely.

“You tried and that’s enough.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“Then ask for help. Ask me. Ask anyone. You aren’t alone.” She wipes away his tears. “For such a smart kid, you’re pretty dumb. All you ever had to do was ask and everyone would help you.”

“I shouldn’t need to ask for help. I’m stronger than this. I should be helping everyone else.”

“Everyone needs help and you’re too kind to be alone.”

That conversation doesn’t magically fix his feelings. But it’s enough that he goes around the village before dawn looking for Missus Lockhart’s favourite flowers, a mix of purple carnations and lilies. He takes a cutting of each and heads to the village cemetery. Missus Lockhart has the nicest gravestone, a terrible compliment, but it’s true. He takes his time planting those flowers around the dark granite of her grave. Hopefully, one day they’ll bloom gloriously. It’s what Aerith would do and anything Aerith would do is a good thing.

“Cloud?”

He cringes and turns around, seeing Tifa. This must look bad. It’s technically not grave digging because he’s digging around the grave. Cloud knows that whenever you need to use technically in your defence, you probably shouldn’t have done it in the first place.

“Hey.”

“What are you doing?”

“Your Ma liked these the most. I thought I’d… make sure she had some.”

There’s something fragile about her right then and there. She isn’t crying. Maybe her tears have run die but she’s still grieving. A good gust looks like it’ll blow her away.

“You don’t have to,” she says, shaking her head. “You don’t.”

He flinches back. “Sorry. I’ll go.”

He means to walk around her but she grabs him by his mud-stained hand. “I didn’t say go away. You can come here whenever you want.”

“I thought you’d be angry with me.”

She stares at him in such abject, disbelieving shock, that Cloud is surprised her eyes don’t fall out. She reaches out hesitantly, touching his still bandaged forearm. It’ll heal in another day or so.

“I’ve never met anyone dumber than you,” Tifa finally says, tracing the folds of bandage with her thumb.

“Sorry?”

She blinks. “You’re impossible.” 

Tifa takes off her wide-brimmed hat and puts it on his head. He grunts in confusion as she pulls the cord to his chin, securing it tightly.

“You keep that on you. Maybe it’ll help get something through your thick skull.”

He nods slowly, confused as always. After two lifetimes, he’d like to think he isn’t a total idiot. But what’s he supposed to do when she’s keeping his chin up with her gentle fingers, forcing him to face her when all he wants is to run away? How is he supposed to meet her unbearably bright gaze and not feel guilty and small?

She pats his cheek gently and turns away from him and the grave. She doesn’t look back for a single moment.

_ I still don’t understand girls. _


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which, Cloud tries to make a friend.

In the weeks since the funeral, Cloud is on his best behaviour. No sneaking around. No getting in trouble. Best to lay low when because it’s a lot easier to be forgiven later if you haven’t been a nuisance.

There are benefits to surviving a Nibel dragon. The important one is that no one ever doubts your abilities to survive in the wilderness. Cloud will disappear for days at a time, sometimes for weeks, without anyone worrying. Well, the first time had resulted in a village-wide search until they’d found Cloud dragging a roe deer home with him. He still isn’t sure why they gave him such strange looks. It was fifty kilograms at most, not even that big. He wasn’t even carrying it over his shoulders but dragging it on a rickety makeshift cart. He wasn’t even injured. So why was everyone giving him the usual Who Let Cloud Strife Do Literally Anything look again?

After that, Cloud had become a common scene amongst the other villages and towns in the Nibel area. He trades meat and pelts for useful household items. He also takes the time to do a lot of planting wherever he roams.

His favourite kill is an adult male Nibel wolf. That gets sold for a pretty neat sum of gill. His mother only smiles fondly despite Cloud being covered in scratches and bleeding badly from the thigh. Well, that smile had come after the screaming match and a caning. And the village doctor ranting for an hour. And a lecture from the village elders. And enforced bed rest. And some cookies delivered to his home.

“I shouldn’t be surprised you inherited my wanderlust,” Ma says whilst Cloud cools his ass with an icepack.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you leave the village.”

“I ran from home and went to Midgar, back before the Plate was a thing. Thought I’d make it big honestly. It didn’t work like that. Made a lot of mistakes. A few enemies.” She smiles. “A lot of good friends as well. But you know, there comes a time when you gotta admit you ain’t cut out for the big city. I stayed in Corel before it burnt and worked in Icicle Town for a few months, thought I might even settle into Gonganga before I made it here.”

“Do you like it here?”

“I don’t hate it. Sometimes, that what you have to settle for.” She pats him on the cheek. “You’re here and that makes this place beautiful.”

Cloud nods and vanishes the next day. Speaking of friends reminds him that he does have a very good friend hiding in the village. In this time, there are still a few Shinra guards protecting the mansion. It’s a dead-end job. Secrecy hides Jenova better than any SOLDIER squadron would.

The first step in his master plan to free Vincent involves flowers which are apparently the answer to most of his problems these days. Sneaking into the mansion grounds isn’t exactly difficult. Setting up rows for future plants isn’t more complicated, though it does take up the entire night.

What does bother him is letting the guards catch him just before dawn. It’s frankly embarrassing.

“Hey!”

Cloud almost rolls his eyes before attempting to bolt in the opposite direction. Except, there’s a guard there which he knew about. He lets the guard catch him after a bit of a struggle.

“This property is off-limits to—Shiva damn it, Strife, who let you out of your house?”

Cloud squirms and thrashes in the guard’s grip, and also liberates a set of keys in the process. He’s dragged back to the village kicking and screaming just when everyone’s waking up. People look at him with that Who Let Cloud Out Again look before going back to their daily lives.

“Missus Strife,” the guard says to his bemused mother, “I think this belongs to you.”

“Thank you. I’ll make sure he doesn’t bother you again.” The guard drops Cloud. “What do you think you were doing?”

“Planting some flowers.” He gives his best shit-eating grin.

Perhaps it’s the sheer audacity that lets him get away without a beating.

He waits till evening before infiltrating the manor. He completely skips the safe because he is not fighting Lost Number at twelve years old and with neither materia nor weapon. He’s suicidally stupid, not suicidal.

The mansion is just as creepy as Cloud remembers it. The issue with secret facilities is that you can’t really have cleaning staff because they might find something and go blab about what they saw. And troopers without supervision will only really keep their living areas clean. Also, barely having any troopers makes for some piss poor security in general.

Cloud descends through the mansion keeping his presence hidden.

Which has the side effect of making him more aware of Jenova’s presence. The crazy psycho alien is always on his periphery, a tangled web of malice just beckoning so sweetly. Barrett’s wise words help him here the most. ‘Don’t stick your dick in crazy’ the big lug had told Cloud, though Cloud wasn’t sure who exactly the advice applied to. Tifa was the exact opposite of crazy.

_ Wait, was he talking about me? Am I the crazy? Was he telling me to go fuck myself? _

He shakes his head and pulls himself from the memories. The door sealing Vincent is weathered and beaten, but it doesn’t have another decade’s worth of grime on it. Still, it’s pretty nasty to force open. And super heavy. The real difficulty is the streams of black sand, so reminiscent of the Arbiters of Fate. They want to block him from entering, but Cloud beat them once before. He reaches deep for the power sleeping in him, the same golden light of his magic, and pushes back against fate.

Before the power to defeat fate, the black sands vanish.

By the time he’s done, Cloud is breathing harshly and stumbles inside. He gets up quickly and comes face to face with the barrel of a gun.

Cloud can’t help his yelp nor can he help falling on his ass. Because fuck guns. Those things are loud and ruptured his eardrums more times than he can count.

“A child.” The gun vanishes. “Leave.”

Vincent Valentine’s voice is just as deep as he remembers. The man looks completely indifferent at seeing a child. Well, being a Turk and then an experiment will do that to a person, Cloud supposes.

“I’m not leaving you here, Vincent. The only way you can find atonement for your sins is if you make the effort.”

Vincent barely shifts in surprise. “Who are you?”

“The name’s Cloud Strife. You don’t know me yet but I know you.”

“I doubt that very much.”

“I know you’re a good man even if you won’t believe it. I know about Chaos. I know about Lucrecia and her child.”

And the gun is back, this time with the distinct hum of primed materia accompanying it. The shift in Vincent is subtle. He doesn’t do anything significantly more threatening, but every instinct Cloud has tell him he’s probably going to die in a bit.

“Who told you that, boy?” Vincent takes one, unnecessarily dramatic step out the coffin. “Are you Hojo’s latest—”

“I’m not Hojo’s anything,” Cloud snarly because fuck that, he belongs to no one, let alone that bastard. “No more than you are.”

“Strange eyes that glow in the dark. Strength enough to open that door. And knowledge that only he would know.”

“I’m from the future. Crazy, I know. I’ll tell you all about it on the way to Cosmo Canyon.” Cloud shrugs as Vincent lowers his gun. “And if you don’t believe me, ask Chaos what it thinks.”

“It thinks you’re a very strange boy.” Vincent crosses his arms. “I still have no reason to entertain a child.”

“I know where Lucrecia is.” It is only through years of knowing Vincent that Cloud can read his very subtle shock. “She’s still alive. I’ll tell you regardless of whether you follow me or not.”


	5. Chapter 5

“Your mother?” Vincent asks after two days of near-silence between them. 

Likely the old assassin thought he could wear Cloud down. Unfortunately, some of Cloud’s fondest memories are biking across the continent alone for days, sometimes even weeks on end. He’d missed a lot of time with his friends doing that. Once, he even missed Denzel’s birthday. Tifa hadn’t stopped giving him shit for months. How was he supposed to know that becoming a kid’s legal guardian basically made you their dad? It’s not like Cloud ever had a father or father shaped figure in his life.

“I established early on that I liked going camping alone,” he explains. “When you fight a baby Nibel dragon and come out alive, people tend to think you can handle yourself alone. Besides, you can’t really say you’re from Nibelheim without going missing in the mountains for a week at some point.”

He’d given Lucretia’s location almost immediately after leaving the mansion and told Vincent to meet him a mile outside town. Then he’d grabbed his usual camping gear and said bye to his Ma. He genuinely hadn’t expected Vincent to still be waiting but the man had appeared from the shadows and walked beside Cloud. 

“Tell me,” Vincent says after another day of walking. 

So, Cloud does. He speaks on the passage of two lifetimes, of Hojo’s mad experiments that led to everything. Zack. Sephiroth. Meteor. Kadaj and his siblings. The war against Deepground. 

By the time he’s done, Cosmo Canyon is in sight. A smile comes unbidden and he decides to roll with it. Cosmo doesn’t have much in the way of traumatic memories if his blurry recollections are correct. 

“And that’s just the first lifetime,” Cloud says and walks ahead. “Let’s mosey on forward.”

The two guards have been watching their approach for a while. He wonders if they make a strange sight, a kid and a man with a giant gold claw. Still, Cloud walks right up to them with his biggest childish grin.

“Y’all mighty fine fellas wanna let me talk to Bugenhagen about the Planet,” he says in the thickest, most archaic, Nibelheim accent he can manage. 

The guards share a look whilst Vincent approaches. It’s the kind of look that comes from years of being stuck in a dead-end job together, a bond far stronger than any marriage or friendship. Well, it isn’t stronger thana Sephiroth and Jenova’s rather incestuous relationship.

_ Wait, I was a Sephiroth clone and that bastard was obsessed with me. Which is as narcissistic as you get but that also means I was part of that weird relationship and oh god— _

He decides to entirely ignore that line of questioning just as the two guards finish deliberating without a word.

“You can wait by the fire,” the burlier of the two says.

“Why that’s mighty fine of you.” He tips his hat just to complete the country bumpkin look.

He walks with some country swagger till he reaches the fire, taking a seat. Vincent sits on the bench beside him, partly watching Cloud but also cataloguing every nook and hidden guard in the area. Cosmo Canyon might be peaceful, but no one is stupid enough to leave it unguarded, especially given their history with the Gi Tribe.  _ Does that count as a tribal conflict? Is Cosmo Canyon more a backwater than wherever Ma’s from? _

“What is your purpose here?” 

Cloud hadn’t expected Vincent to say another word for the rest of the trip. That’s another good sign that he believes Cloud. That, or he’s so bored that repentance for his supposed sins isn’t worth staying cooped up in a coffin.

“To make sure Nanaki’s safe and maybe find some answers on what I am.”

“A delusional child,” Vincent offers.

“Was that a joke? You can joke? What alternate reality am I… oh, I’m a dumbass.”

Vincent doesn’t laugh but he leans back just slightly. That’s more than enough for Cloud. Less chance of Vincent’s Turk instincts activating and suddenly assassinating someone. And whilst that might not have happened in any timeline, this one is just different enough for anything to be possible.

Their entertainment is cut short by the arrival of Bugenhagen, Nanaki, and a third lion-wolf-thing—and yes, Cloud could call Nanaki’s race Guardians of the Planet, but that sounds like a title, not a species name, so he won’t. Seeing Bugenhagen walking, strained though it is, brings a spark of joy to Cloud. It’s a lot better than finding his mutilated corpse.

The trio sits across the fire from Cloud and Vincent.

“You’re the one the Planet won’t shut up about,” Bugenhagen says without preamble. “It calls you  _ Saviour _ .”

“I did not sign up for that job.” He scowls.

“It also says that whilst it appreciates your attempts to reverse the effects of mako extraction, that you still have other duties to attend to.”

That, for whatever reason, makes the other lion-wolf-thing send a disdainful look at Nanaki. “It seems the Planet has terrible taste in its guardians as usual.”

“Deneh,” Bugenhagen says sternly. The newly named Deneh tilts her head away. “Why are you abandoning your duties?”

“Because apparently being Saviour to the Planet comes with no job description, health benefits, or job security. Look, if the Planet could get its shit sorted out then it wouldn’t have brought me here after not one, but two separate lifetimes.”

And Cloud continently pretends that he wasn’t right at the centre of those conflicts, usually causing just as many problems as he fixed.  _ That damned black materia. _

“If I hadn’t heard it from the Planet, I would find your claim to be absurd,” Nanaki says, staring into the fire. “What exactly are you?”

“What am I?” Cloud shrugs. “You’d have to ask the Planet that. It made me as I am but gave me no answers. My best guess is that I’m some new type of WEAPON.”

“You?” Deneh scoffs. “I could rip you in half.”

“You can certainly try.” It isn’t arrogance. Cloud’s got a hunting knife and whilst that’s not really a sword, it’s close enough. Cloud is nice and has learnt to smile easily, but he’s also a ruthless killer.

“Enough, Deneh.” Bugenhagen sighs. “You’ve left the parasite alone despite it being in your hometown.”

“Because destroying it is a catalyst for the end of the world,” he says bluntly. “If we destroy Jenova, we’ll send her to the lifestream. She’ll mutate lifeforms and poison the air and soil. Even the Summons and WEAPONS can be twisted. It’s what happened the second time around. Shiva froze her for a reason. If it was that simple, I would have burnt her to a crisp already.”

The dawning horror on the trio’s faces is certainly entertaining, but Cloud has little interest in it. They all need to understand the gravity of the situation. A world with enraged and mutated Summons is a world where there is no hope. The corrupted Knights of the Round had killed what remained of Shinra’s army and the Phoenix had spread pestilence across the West Continent.

“The other issue is the presence of Sephiroth. Jenova’s bad, but Sephiroth makes her look like a regular monster. We have to remove him as a threat.”

“Assassination,” Vincent murmurs.

“We could kill him before he awakens to his  _ truth  _ but even now, he would be able to kill us all. I may one day surpass him as a fighter, but that won’t happen for a few years yet.”

“Then?” Nanaki asks.

“We save him from himself. We’ll show him the truth and remove the triggers for his insanity. Because I don’t believe he’s insane. Not yet.”

At least, the part of Cloud that is Zack doesn’t, and he’s a good judge of character. Not the absolute best, but significantly better than Cloud with his stunted emotional development. 

“But let’s not completely table any assassinations. Hojo and Hollander from Shinra Science Department are fair game. Without Hojo’s manipulations, Sephiroth might not go insane. And without Hollander, there won’t be anyone to convince Genesis to defect with half of Soldier.”

“And you believe you have the right to change fate?” Bugenhagen asks. “What right do you have to make these decisions for the Planet.”

“The same right anyone else has to try and make things better. And besides, I earned my right to defy fate.” He nods towards Vincent and Nanaki. “You both journeyed with me to save the world. I’ve failed you before but this time I can change things. We can change things.”

“This coward journeyed with you?” Deneh snarls, standing to her full height. Her fur bristles and her teeth are almost barred. 

“How many times have I told you I’m not afraid of the ritual.” It isn’t a question from Nanaki. There’s something tired and resigned in his words.

“Cowardice is all you’ve ever known.”

Cloud stares at them in confusion. “Nanaki is many things but a coward is not one of them.”

“Then you never knew Nanaki,” she snaps. “This coward would run away from his duties rather than face them.”

“Maybe I don’t know the Nanaki you know now but I very much doubt a coward would have fought to save the world without hesitation. Maybe years of experimentation hardened him”—Both Nanaki and Deneh flinch back—“hardened him into something different, but I don’t think you can change the core of a person. Because he was with me through every battle. Through every moment of grief. And when things were hopeless, he did not abandon me. So yes, continue to call him a coward whilst I’m here. It won’t go well for you.”

“I think it best you calm down,” Bugenhagen says.

It takes him a moment to understand why. Both Nanaki and Deneh look ready for a fight, Nanaki positioned to shield her. Vincent has a grip on his gun.

Cloud takes a breath because his vision is getting hazy, flecks of green obscuring his sight. He’s getting emotional and bad things happen when Cloud isn’t calm. And as the green flecks fade, so too does the gold energy surrounding his hands.

“Sorry, I tend to get annoyed when people insult my friends.”

Deneh growls at him then stomps back to her original spot, shoulder checking Nanaki—who yelps—in the process. “Fine, tell us your story.”

It isn’t a request but a demand.

“We won our battles against Sephiroth,” Cloud says coldly. “He died and died and kept on losing. No matter what he did, he could never win. And he learnt he never would. He might be able to come back but he would never truly win because the story was already written. Sephiroth and I, all of us really, we were all part of a story that had been told ad infinitum. I don’t know how Sephiroth learnt that truth but he did, and he hatched a plan to break free from his endless cycle of fate.”

Bugenhagen hums, watching Deneh carefully. “You make it sound like a human could outmanoeuvre fate.”

“I may hate him, but he’s still brilliant. Sephiroth found a way to remake the world. Not in his image but in his design. The broad strokes remained the same. Nibelheim in flames. The Sector 5 plate dropping. President Shinra’s assassination. But because he remembered, fate itself had to intervene. The Planet sent its Arbiters to ensure the story remained the same. They pushed us all towards the same major events even if we could make new details.”

Cloud smiles, remembering meeting Aerith again.  _ Don’t fall in love with me _ , she’d told him, somehow knowing her fate. And Cloud had because the part of him that is Zack would always love Aerith, no matter what. Tifa’s concerns and hesitancy were new, but they somehow made her all the more real alongside the manipulative streak that had Cloud dancing to her whims. There was nothing malicious to it, but it left him stunned. Barrett’s skill as a leader, as someone worthy of following, was spectacular to witness. Beneath the bluster and boldness was someone worthy of entrusting your life to, someone who cared so deeply that his massive chest couldn’t contain all the heart he had. The memories are a stream of moments unordered with little relation; Nanaki’s words of wisdom becoming Aerith tending flowers flowing into Cid’s casual curses in the middle of a fight and Zack’s broad back spurring him onwards and—

“Cloud,” Vincent prompts softly in the here and now.

He shakes his head. “Sorry. I’ve always had trouble getting lost in my memories. Anyway, Sephiroth changed one simple detail. He let us see him at the end. It meant we had a definitive goal to chase. In my first life, we chased him as well, but he was a looming spectre in the background. In the second, he was a living goal to chase. Do you understand why that’s important?”

“The broad strokes remained the same but the details were different,” Nanaki guesses. “He wanted you to follow him. Why?”

Cloud nods. “We called them the Arbiter of Fate. We thought he was controlling them somehow, but he was sliding between the strands of destiny. Every little thing he did was to make them the villain. We followed him and battled fate over a Midgard that never was or can ever be. There, we won against fate itself. We earned the right to write a new story.”

For all the suffering Cloud went through, he deserves being able to tell his own story. He extends his tiny, fragile hand, and a pulse of golden magic emanates from it.

And then they see the swirling black sands of destiny, of Fate’s futile efforts to control the future. But they can’t. Around Cloud are strands of golden time, earned for his struggles in battling destiny in another timeline. He will forever be able to walk outside fate and make his own story.

The same gold sand surrounds Nanaki and Vincent though not to the same extent. Around Nanaki’s forearm where his bracers would one day go. A churning miasma of sand around Vincent’s mechanical hand.

“And all our struggles came to mean nothing.”

“What happened?”

“We chased him across the world. We fought against the world and had we left fate alone, we could have won. But, when we freed ourselves of destiny, we also freed Sephiroth from his fate of losing. I lost different friends. Different cities burnt. Different atrocities took place. We became more powerful than ever, walking gods even amongst the enhanced and it wasn’t enough. The Planet died and he achieved his goal. He broke us with despair and then he killed us.”

Cloud exhales, staring at the bonfire. For a moment, he sees Nibelheim burning once more. But only a moment. That’s a future that will never come to pass. As long as Cloud lives, the atrocities Sephiroth committed won’t take place again.

“That’s my life in a nutshell. I’m no saviour. I’m just someone who knows we have to put in the effort now or it won’t mean anything.”

“And if things change for the worse?” Bugenhagen asks.

“Then maybe we deserve what comes next. But it’s a risk we should be willing to take.”

“You risked a lot changing my future,” Nanaki says. “If I truly was fated to be an experiment, then perhaps that is what should have happened. Perhaps trying to change fate will make us no better than Sephiroth.”

Cloud stands abruptly because he has never heard something so stupid, so ridiculous, from any of his friends. The action startles everyone as he takes three big steps to stand before Nanaki.

“You’re not the Nanaki I knew so you saying that shouldn’t hurt as much as it does. You weren’t there when my fractured psyche nearly doomed the world. You didn’t mourn with me as we lost our friends. But it still does hurt.” Cloud may have the memories of two grown men, but his body is a child’s. His tears are a child’s tears. “Do you really think I care for you so little that I would let you suffer?”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The author got very distracted by moving, school, and getting addicted to Genshin Impact.

After that rather emotional outburst from Cloud, Bugenhagen decides dinner would make for a good intermission in events. Thankfully, someone realises a kid eats like three adults and brings Cloud two servings of sticky rice, soup, and skewered meat. Vincent declines entirely whilst Nanaki very politely tears his way through the thigh of an animal almost the same size as him.

Deneh, however, is eating a very large portion of the same greens Cloud has. She notices his attention and looks up.

“I’m a vegetarian.”

Cloud blinks. “Now I’ve heard everything.”

“We are omnivores,” Nanaki says, though it’s hardly convincing with animal fat on his chin like a toddler. And then he licks his fangs for extra measure. 

“You’re a giant lion-dog-thing. I know for a fact you have no teeth for grinding plants. What kind of biology do they teach in this backwater?”

Vincent rumbles in amusement. “Nibelheim is the epitome of a backwater.”

“Yeah, but we learn biology.”

“From a village elder? Maybe a shaman? Or is it entirely at the discretion of your parents?”

Technically, it’s an unholy mixture of all three. Cloud simply scowls and gets back to his meal, ignoring the rest as they proceed to laugh at him.

By the time dinner is done, Cloud is half-asleep. He’s shown to a room and passes out immediately, haunted by strange nightmares of Sephiroth and Jenova, of a world on fire and more death than he ever wants to see again. He awakens before dawn and finds Vincent there, still as a statue. Cloud waves and settles in beside him as they wait for Bugenhagen and Nanaki to send them off.

“Deneh’s patrolling,” Nanaki explains before Cloud needs to ask.

“That’s… nice?”

“What am I supposed to do?”

Cloud shrugs. “Get stronger. Maybe deal with your daddy issues beforehand.”

“I do not have daddy—”

“You think your father’s a coward and hate him.” He’s looking at Bugenhagen who pales drastically. “Go to the Caves of Gi. Make your decision after that.” 

Bugenhagen places a hand on Nanaki’s shoulder, calming him slightly. “I think we shall.”

Cloud nods and tips his imaginary hat. “It’s been a right pleasure meeting y’all.”

“Please stop with that horrible accent.”

“I’ll have you know that this is an authentic Nibelheim accent. I accepted your culture and you can’t accept my speech.” Cloud shakes his head dramatically. “Shame on you, Nanaki.”

He leaves with a grin and a wave. Vincent follows for a few hours before turning off in the direction of Lucrecia’s cave. Then he picks up the pace, his red cape becoming smaller and smaller. It reminds Cloud of old times. He, Vincent, and Nanaki were the fastest and had the most endurance. Crossing the continent on foot was something they did in his first lifetime. Death and grief made it impossible in the second.

“Not this time,” he decides and sets off in a random direction off the road.

It takes him the better part of six weeks to make the journey home. Part of it has to do with being bored and wanting to see new sights. Secret valleys between rock formations he’s never seen before, the air crisp and glistening with hoarfrost. A tiny lake hidden by a forest illuminated by thick coral. A great dragon dying in a cave that Cloud refuses to leave alone, staying with it till its fading breath. He sleeps in trees and under great roots, bathes in chilling lakes, and meets new people. His biggest surprise had been seeing another of Nanaki’s species bounding across grassland, gone so quick that Cloud is still partly convinced the indigo lion-wolf-thing was a figment of his imagination.

_ Ma was right about me wanderlust _ . Maybe it’s how he runs away from his duties but he can’t ignore that yearning deep in him to keep moving, to explore and challenge the Planet’s expansive biomes. 

When he sets his sights back to Nibelheim, Spring is just around the corner. The weather is warm enough that he walks shirtless, sweating in weather people from Gongonga and the Golden Saucer would call chilly. It’s why his usual outfits are always sleeveless and have zips. Anything above freezing is pretty damned hot.

In the distance, a great plume of smoke darkens the horizon. His heart catches in his throat. And then he’s sprinting his way through the forest, avoiding roots and trees, and making the trek up to Nibelheim.

To his relief, the village is standing and unharmed for the most part but for the Mansion which is an inferno. The heat is so thick that Cloud’s going to get sunburn just looking at it. Probably the same with the villagers working to put out the fire.

“Cloud!”

It’s Tifa calling. He heads over and hugs her before he can stop himself. “What happened?”

“Don’t know. Some strange guy came in asking for ya Ma. Silver hair was strange but he was real polite.”

His world tilts on its axis and his stomach lurches. It’s happening again. Everything he’s done to protect her, to protect everyone, and it’s already coming undone.

“Went to the Reactor with her a bit before the fire started.”

The world is tinged green as he breaks away from Tifa and sprints away. He ignores her cries because she’s safe. And very, very far away from Sephiroth.

Cloud doesn’t care that this is a few years too early. This is exactly the sort of thing the bastard would do. The monsters on the path are slaughtered, blood staining the rocks and the few plants still growing. The slashes are all thin and long, hallmarks of Masamune.

Halfway up, a massive fire blooms. The wave of heat is so strong that Cloud feels his throat go dry and his nose burn.

“No, no, no, no, no.”

Static and overlaying memories obscure his vision as he moves. The reactor is covered in thick smoke tinged an otherworldly colour. The heat is oppressive, but Cloud doesn’t care. What are a few burns in comparison to a life?

“Ma!” he calls out, not stopping as he descends through the reactor. “Ma, where are you?”

In the back of his mind, he can hear a sharp hum. It’s like metal clanging or the high-pitched whine of a Zuu dying. It’s like long fingers reaching into his mind, trying to draw him into a nestled mass of sweet nothings. They promise something glorious and brilliant. A feather falls. Cloud stares at it in horror as he finally, finally understands. 

Jenova.

She’s here and she’s awake years early.

He fails to keep the contents of his stomach down. It only gets worse the further in he gets. The soldiers are dead. The experiments have been slashed in half. Blood and guts and ichor and glowing mako splattered on walls and floors and the ceiling. Shards of glass slice through his boots but Cloud doesn’t care.

The doors to Jenova’s chamber are open. Cloud enters, knowing what he will see and already hating everything.

“Sephiroth,” he snarls.

He’s right there, right in front of Cloud. This is  _ The  _ Sephiroth, the one that’s haunted Cloud across memories of two lifetimes. The one who remade the world out of spite. The same one who killed his mother twice and has her in his hands.

“Oh, how I’ve missed you,” the bastard says, lit by the crimson emergency lights. “We are bound together endlessly. Did you think fleeing to a new world would save you from despair?”

“Don’t you dare,” he begs because that’s his mother in Sephiroth’s hands. For a third time.

“Then stop me. Show me the power that let you breathe a new world into life. Show me your strength, Saviour of the Planet.”

He can’t. They both know Cloud is a child. Even if he is as strong than other children, that doesn’t say much in the face of someone who can slice buildings in half. But that’s his mother. And he refuses to let her suffer again.

There is power hiding deep in his soul. It isn’t a Limit or magic or anything like that. This power burns like lightning and fire. It churns like a violent storm and lifts him to new realms of strength.

_ I need a weapon _ .

And so, his power provides one. Pure golden light erupts in waves and in his hands, the golden sands of fate defiant forge the shape of his final weapon. In his hands, the ethereal outline of the Fusion Blades is birthed into existence.

It weighs nothing. It isn’t real, nothing more than a dream of a past life and his hopes for victory. But the sharp edge is a brilliant gold, so bright it’s like another sun was birthed. And with it, just maybe he can change fate again. Maybe he can save his mother.

When he moves, it’s like he’s become lightning. There is only one attack that’s ever truly managed to stop Sephiroth. Ominslash, his final Limit and his greatest tool. Gold and green, sunlight and lifestream, follow him as he moves faster than his tiny body has any right to.

He leaps across the connecting walkway leaving behind a streak of bright light and swings the blade. And just when it would hit, he  _ shifts _ away because Masamune is there to block the attack. The world breaks as Cloud needs to be somewhere else, time fracturing and space shattering to his whims. 

And then Cloud is in the air, swinging his imaginary sword. At the same time, he’s behind Sephiroth, thrusting his blade. He’s in front of Sephiroth, swinging his blade with all the strength his tiny body possesses. He’s also pulling his mother back, praying against all hope that she’ll be fine.

Sephiroth blocks each strike with casual ease. Seven attacks in total and he simply does not care that Cloud broke spacetime. That’s the difference between them, the unfathomable chasm that separates them.

The bastard simply looms over Cloud who is crouched before his mother, imaginary sword drawn. His body trembles from fear, from exhaustion. The world has compressed to a narrow point that is Sephiroth and nothing else. The blood rushing through his ears deafens him or maybe that’s the screeching alarms.

The kick comes so fast that he only processes he’s in the air moments before he hits the first stair and stumbles down. Ma lands beside him, groaning unconsciously. Good. She’s still alive even if she’s bleeding.

Cloud forces himself up, legs trembling and arms shaking.

Clack. 

Clack. 

Clack. 

Sephiroth descends down the stairs, wreathed in an alien light. His wing extends, black feathers whirling in the smoke. Masamune reflects the light of the fires, glowing a brilliant gold.

“Cloud, how long will it take for you to realise I am inevitable? All this struggling. Every change you’ve made. Your efforts are admirable but worthless.”

“Stay back.”

Sephiroth smiles. There is nothing pleasant or kind about it. “Make me.”

When Sephiroth moves, Cloud doesn’t even see it. One moment, he’s standing in front of his mother. The next, he’s in the air, Masamune impaled through his shoulder. It takes a moment for him to register the pain, and when he does, his scream rends the air.

“You’ve suffered far worse,” Sephiroth says gently. “You’ll suffer far more. You wanted me to become a memory but you forgot that memories define a person.”

Sephiroth flings him away. Cloud slams into a tank hard, glass shattering and refined make spilling all over him. It burns and stings and he’s back to those days with Zack, stuck in a tank, helpless. Static consumes his vision and he nearly falls into his memories.

And then he hears her scream. His mother’s scream of pain. A sound that’s haunted him for so long. He forces his eyes open to see Sephiroth standing over her, blood everywhere. And yet, she’s still alive. Suffering, but alive. 

“Please don’t,” Cloud begs, tired and broken and done with it all. “Take my life instead.”

“I would be so bored without you defying me. Chase after me, Cloud. Assemble your allies. Assemble your army. Become the hero of this story. Soar to new heights of strength and legend so that I can taste your delectable despair, again and again and again.”

Sephiroth flicks his sword casually. And just like that, Cloud watches his mother die.

As his vision fades, he sees feathers falling to the ground.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I remember when I had dreams of this being a crack story.

Genesis Rhapsodos, SOLDIER First Class and hero, is beyond frustrated with his current assignment. Nibelheim. A tiny town in the middle of nowhere with the only redeeming factor of having a reactor that powers it and the surrounding towns and villages.

That’s the only reason the village is even on a Shinra map. There are bigger towns in the region that aren’t represented because of how unimportant they are to Shinra.

“You want me to leave the war effort and go to this tiny town?” Genesis asks inside a cramped command tent, sitting on a cheap plastic chair.

“For the third time, yes.” 

He’s speaking to Sephiroth. They’re friends of a sort. Together with Angeal, they are the greatest fighters in the world. And one day, Genesis will completely surpass Sephiroth. He’s already outstripped the others in magical ability, having created spells the likes of which the world hasn’t seen. Even then, Sephiroth’s sword skill and raw physical ability place him above Genesis in a fight.

“You just want all the glory.”

Sephiroth doesn’t roll his eyes or anything so mundane. It’s a tiny twitch of his right index finger that gives him away.

“I won’t even be on the battlefield. They recalled me as well after Hojo and Hollander were assassinated.”

Genesis knows that Sephiroth’s feelings over his father are complicated and they only became more convoluted after the assassination. If he was a good friend, he wouldn’t mention it or maybe even try to comfort him.

“You’re sure you haven’t picked up gunplay? I know you’ve been struggling in our spars, but even you should know a gun is a rather crass weapon.”

For the barest moment, Sephiroth’s jaw clenches at the insinuation. Then his features relax, leaving him with his usual blank smile. As far as Genesis can tell, he trained that expression in the mirror for a few years to get the right mixture of confidence and approachability. Honestly, it just intimidates the lower ranks.

“This is an order from the President himself. Go investigate the Nibelheim Reactor attack and find out if it’s linked at all to the recent assassinations.”

“ _ Wings of light and dark spread afar _ .”

“Loveless Act I.”

“ _ Even if the morrow is barren of promise, nothing shall forestall my return _ .”

Sephiroth exhales but his feature soften. It’s as close to a laugh as he’ll get out of the General.

“Now you’re just being petulant.”

“Perhaps you should educate yourself more. Only an uncultured heathen wouldn’t appreciate Loveless.”

“I would gladly be excommunicated from your Loveless cult.”

“What’s going to happen to Angeal?”

“He’ll stay on the front. Soldier must maintain a presence at Wutai.”

Genesis huffs. “You realise he’ll find a way to sue for peace and we’ll have gained nothing.”

“Is peace so wrong?”

“Coming from the man with the highest body count? Sounds pretty hypocritical and insincere.”

“Think of it as a company vacation.”

“To the middle of ducking nowhere surrounded by village idiots.”

“At least you won’t have to deal with the paperwork.”

Genesis waves him away, utterly done with the conversation. Wutai is far more important but at least Sephiroth won’t get any glory. Maybe there’s a terrorist cell that destroyed the reactor that he can murder. There’s some glory in that, right?

Who is he kidding? Genesis knows this is a dead-end task that should be dealt with by a squad of Thirds and a trooper platoon at most. Maybe some of Scarlett’s unnecessarily complicated machines that only have a high kill count if you include friendly fire and self-destructs.

There’s a helicopter waiting for him manned by some baby Turk. “Great, I’m going to fucking die in a crash.”

Genesis gets on and settles in for a long trip. Then Genesis realises something. He doesn’t have his signature red jacket. His last one got torn to shreds and his replacements are all in Midgard.

“Fuck.”

##  ***

The helicopter ride takes the better of a full day with a refuel at a smaller outpost. Genesis wakes up only once to use the surprisingly clean restroom. By clean, he means he only caught five STDs as opposed to seven.

There’s already a Shinra platoon waiting in the at the landing pad outside the town. Some brilliant engineer at Shinra had decided that there needed to be a landing pad at the reactor and one situated outside the village. Genesis immediately flags it down as potential embezzling because the frame is rickety and it looks shoddily built at best.

Outside, he’s greeted by air cold enough that he regrets not using the regulation overcoat but those are disease-riddled bundles of ugly material. Genesis wouldn’t be caught dead in one.

There’s a trooper waiting for him, a Sergeant to be specific. Shinra couldn’t even be arsed to bring in a commission officer. There’s ash on the man’s regulation uniform. He’s foregone any sort of overcoat which makes Genesis thinks he’s from a colder climate.

He spies two infantry grunts further back with Materia on their person and almost smiles. Apparently, Shinra is taking this more seriously than the lowly Sergeant would imply. Whilst not everyone could join Soldier or had the aptitude to be a shock trooper or join some other specialised group, there are still quite a few infantrymen with the magical power to use materia. 

The man salutes. “Commander Rhapsodos, I am—”

“I really don’t care. Just give me a rundown of the situation.”

“Sir.”

The explanation paints an odd picture. A stranger with Shinra knowledge had strolled into town, convinced the mansion guards he was a high ranking official, slaughtered said guards, planted timed explosives in the mansion and then grabbed one of the villagers as a guide to the reactor.

“Do we have a description of the stranger?”

The Sergeant shakes his head. “Conflicting statements from the villagers.”

“You’re telling me they’re so incompetent that they can’t even see a person now.”

A wince from the Sergeant confirms that. “Everything from hair colour to physical appearance to height changes depending on who you ask. Current theory from the Science Officer is that we’re possibly looking at a cognitohazard, Sir.”

“Continue.”

Apparently, the explosions had gone off just after the stranger left the village. Reasonably enough, the villagers mounted firefighting efforts that stopped the fire from spreading. From the forensics report, the stranger had slaughtered his way up the mountain, killing a Nibel Dragon in the process, and every guard and experiment in the reactor itself.

“Whatever was being worked on was stolen and another fire started to destroy evidence.” The Seargent shakes his head in disgust. “Only the two civilians were left alive.”

“Two?”

“Yes sir. Claudia and Cloud Strife, mother and son.”

“Status?”

“The mother was killed by a bladed weapon. Preliminary reports indicate it was likely the same weapon used on some of the monsters, but the cuts are inconsistent with what killed the rest of the monsters. The son was stabbed in the shoulder by perhaps a spear or another thin blade before being thrown in a tank of refined mako.”

Genesis winces. Even he’d be in a medical coma if he took a bath in refined mako. It might only last a day or two, but that’s because he’s enhanced. For a normal child, they’d be lucky to have organ failure. Rampant mutations and cancer would be the only outcome if they survived.

“Have the corpses been preserved?”

“That’s the thing, Sir, the boy’s alive.”

_ Well, this just got interesting _ .

Genesis heads towards Nibelheim, completely ignoring the Sergeant. He got what he came for and doesn’t need anything else from the lackey. Besides, he can get somewhere warm faster if he leaves now. The Sergeant follows a few steps behind, smart enough to stay silent now that Genesis doesn’t need him.

There’s a surprising amount of greenery and moss on the ground as he approaches but it’s nothing compared to the village itself. He notices the flowers growing on windowsills and flowerpots outside and between rocky areas. He’d expected Nibelheim to be a frozen tundra but it’s a vibrant garden of reds and purples and blues, long vines and tall trees swaying in the wind.

Every single environmentalist theory over the reactors draining the life out of the Planet clearly never visited Nibelheim, home to the oldest reactor. Even now he sees villagers tending to the flowers. 

There’s a large home further back and right next to it is a massive bouquet of flowers. Genesis doesn’t know the funerary rites of these backwater villagers, but even he can recognise a sign of mourning. That, and there are two Shinra grunts outside the door. 

“Excuse me.”

Genesis turns and sees a young girl standing before him. She’s got a worried expression. Her father a bit behind her has an even more worried expression. 

_ Shinra really does have a bad reputation _ . 

“Yes?”

“Those guards won’t let me see Cloud.”

“Yes, and neither will I.” He claps his hands once. “All of you get back to your homes and stop interfering with Shinra operations. That way I won’t have to call another platoon in.”

That spurs her father to grab her and pull her back despite her struggling. Genesis rolls his eyes and strides into the home. Immediately, he’s again greeted by the fact that this is a poor backwater village. There are benches in the dining room as if this is some ancient hall where filthy, grubby warriors would sit and make too much noise before going into battle. The appliances look older than Genesis—no, they look older than his parents.

There’s a room right across the kitchen but that’s empty. Genesis stalks up the vary narrow flight of stairs and finds a bedroom that’s slightly bigger than the one downstairs. There’s a chest at the foot of the bed and a small desk currently occupied by a nurse.

He waves away the nurse’s salute and approaches the kid.

There’s nothing special about the boy. Blond hair. Likely between eight to ten years. Bandages covering his torso and his right leg prominently. Anyone else Genesis would have ignored. But this kid survived a mako bath and he looks perfectly human. No sign of mutation.

“How long has he been like that?”

“Four days now, Sir.” The nurse’s voice is surprisingly deep for someone so small. “He’s showing symptoms of mako poisoning.”

“Naturally.”

“Except his bloodwork shows an abnormally high mako absorption rate. He’s filtering it the same way you would.”

Genesis frowns and approaches the boy. He pulls an eyelid up. The eyes are gold. Bright, vibrant gold. So vivid even in a coma that it leaves Genesis dizzy.

“Turn off the lights and shut the curtain,” he snaps.

The nurse rushes to follow his order. And when the room is darkened, Genesis sees something amazing. 

_ His eyes are glowing.  _

“Do you think his mako absorption rate is natural or artificial?” he asks carefully.

The nurse keeps his features blank. “The Science officer has yet to disclose their analysis.”

_ More company politicking _ . Genesis almost sighs but that would be too obvious. With the mansion and reactor gone, who knows what this kid was used for. He might be the latest in the Science Department’s experiments in a similar vein to Project G.

_ Project C, I suppose. _

Genesis nods. “Keep the kid safe.” Then he heads downstairs to find the Sergeant. He gestures and the sergeant falls in step with Genesis as they walk out the village to the stares of the villagers now in their homes. 

“How distracted has the Science Officer been?”

The Sergeant winces. “Too distracted to notice her communications have been delayed indefinitely.”

“Good. Initiate a lockdown and keep the Science officer confined.”

“Understood Commander.”

Genesis sighs when the Sergeant heads back to follow his orders before heading to the second landing pad. There’s a small comms hub that he commandeers and connects to his bulky PHS. He makes a call and has to wait a few minutes before it gets through.

“Genesis? Do you need help already?”

“No, but I think we’ve stumbled onto a Science experiment gone wrong. Long story short before comms are cut off, but there’s a kid with mako eyes. Wrong colour but I know the glow. They’re gold.”

“That’s different from anything Hojo or Hollander made.”

“Exactly.”

“That’s odd, certainly, but—”

“He also survived a dip in a refined mako tank. He’s fine, Sephiroth.”

“That’s… keep me appraised. I’ll investigate on my end.”

“You do that.”

The call ends. Genesis sets the PHS down and erases every trace of his call. It was risky enough sending it without going through their usual protocols but this was urgent. He turns back to find the Sergeant is waiting outside hearing range.  _ Well trained. I’d have had to kill him if he wasn’t. _

Maybe something of his thoughts shows on his face because the Sergeant pales but doesn’t back away. He waits until Genesis has approached before speaking in flat, clipped tones.

“Commander, he’s awake.” 


End file.
